I have been waiting for a while to see Chasing Ice come to video and was blessed this week in seeing it.  I must admit I still feel the disappointment I felt missing it on the big screen. The images are stunning, the story amazing and the evidence of climate change in glacial retreat and permafrost melt, well it is just plain scary.

The documentary follows the National Geographic sponsored project by the photographer James Balog.  He set out to visually document climate change by taking time lapse photography of the retreat of glaciers.

The melting of the glaciers is viewed by many climate scientists as ‘the canary in the mine’ and watching this compelling documentary was left with the deep and disturbing sense that if the canary ain’t dead it ain’t far from it.

Balog’s images capture on film major parts of our environment simply disappearing as ice walls collapse, glaciers retreat and permafrost melts. 

In the midst of the various statements made Balog speaks of the deep fears that many within the scientific community are expressing.  It is a fear he says that simply is not being translated yet into the general community and more particularly our political leaders.  With this in mind Chasing Ice seems less like something to recommend as opposed to something which should be mandatory viewing for everyone

Maybe this is because we live in such an instant society and so we are incapable of seeing beyond our lunch appointment tomorrow or our next holidays. But if climate change is the biggest threat to humanity and the biggest moral challenge of our time then maybe we should start acting as of this was the case.  Certainly a few days out from our election the commitment to reduce carbon  emissions by 5% seems more about tokenism than a serious commitment to the issue.

Psalm 8 speaks of our responsbility in our dominion over creation.  I have asked the question in more than one sermon, so how do we think we are going with that dominoon thing?